Does failure to distinguish the quality and food safety attributes have effect on willingness to pay for food safety?
Xhevat Sopi
University of Gjilani Kadri Zeka, Republic of Kosovo
xhevat.sopi@uni-gjilan.net
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to determine whether the dairy consumers in Kosovo make a clear distinguish between safety and quality attributes, which is the impact of socio-demographic factors, and if the recognition of these attributes has an impact on willingness to pay (WTP) price premium for food safety standards. The observation was conducted with 303 consumers of Viva Fresh Store supermarkets. The results show that 90% of the respondents mix the safety concept with the one of quality. Factors like: education level, incomes and the place of residence have a significant correlation (p<0,05) with the variable of concepts clarity. Test Chi Square shows that WTP variations are not dependent in terms of clarity between two concepts (p>0,05). The most number of consumers (74,8%) are WTP for premium price on food safety standards. The assessment on food safety, at a certain degree is “high” or “very high” (48,83%).
Keywords: food safety; willingness to pay; quality attributes; socio-demographic factors